Philippines ready to secure APEC participants: official

MANILA, Philippines (Xinhua) - The government said today that it is prepared to secure the delegates of the Asia- Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meetings this year after recent successful visit of Pope Francis in the country.

Department of Foreign Affairs spokesman Charles Jose said that the security measures being implemented during the Pope's visit here on Jan. 15-19 apparently became a rehearsal for the APEC summit.

Prior to the APEC summit in November where leaders of the 21- member economies are expected to attend, Manila will be hosting the first APEC Senior Officials' Meeting and Related Meetings or SOM1 from Jan. 26 to Feb. 7 at the Clark and Subic Freeport Zones in northern Philippines.

"We have the national organizing committee and under that is the security preparations, and of course, we're also working with the local government units and we can assure that we are doing all the necessary security preparations to ensure the safety of all the delegates attending the SOM-1 meeting," he said.

The upcoming meeting in Clark will tackle how each APEC working group can advance the APEC 2015 priorities under the overall theme of "Building Inclusive Economies, Building a Better World," he said.